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State Budget Initiative Enters Circulation

State Budget. Initiative Constitutional Amendment.

SACRAMENTO - Secretary of State Debra Bowen today announced that the proponent of a new initiative may begin collecting petition signatures for his measure.

The Attorney General prepares the legal title and summary that is required to appear on initiative petitions. When the official language is complete, the Attorney General forwards it to the proponent and to the Secretary of State. The Secretary of State then provides calendar deadlines to the proponent and to county elections officials, and the initiative may be circulated for signatures. The Attorney General's official title and summary for the measure is as follows:

STATE BUDGET. INITIATIVE CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT. Any statute, state budget, or legislative constitutional change that decreases state revenues or increases state program or agency costs by $25 million or more in a fiscal year must include offsetting revenues or spending cuts. Establishes a two-year budget cycle, with five-year fiscal projections. Permits the Governor to cut the budget midyear when a fiscal crisis has been declared and Legislature fails to act. Requires the budget bill to be in print three days before its adoption. Requires state program performance reviews. Summary of estimate by Legislative Analyst and Director of Finance of fiscal impact on state and local government: Increases in state spending -- potentially tens of millions of dollars per year -- to administer new budgeting process requirements. Potentially significant, but unknown, fiscal effects for the state and local governments affected by state budgetary decisions. (11-0009.)

The Secretary of State's tracking number for this measure is 1485 and the Attorney General's tracking number is 11-0009.

The proponent for this measure, James C. Harrison, must collect signatures of 807,615 registered voters – the number equal to eight percent of the total votes cast for governor in the 2010 gubernatorial election – in order to qualify it for the ballot. The proponent has 150 days to circulate petitions for this measure, meaning the signatures must be collected by October 21, 2011.

The initiative proponent can be reached at (510) 346-6200.

To sign up for regular ballot measure updates via email, RSS feed, or Twitter, go to www.sos.ca.gov/multimedia.

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